Data may be stored in many different forms and delivered to many different types of platforms. For example, movies, music, and games may be stored on a CD (or compact disc) or DVD (or digital versatile disc), which can be read by a personal computer, game console, or disc player for delivery to the user. The primary drawbacks of a physical format such as a CD or DVD are the portability of the disc, the portability of the player, the potential loss of the data if the disc is physically damaged, and the inability to control copying and piracy of the data. More recently, electronic formats have enabled movies, music, books, photographs, and games to be downloaded or streamed via the Internet or local area network (“LAN”) to a device connected to a server that stores the data, such as media content. These electronic formats are usually more portable than physical media and the players used to view such electronic formats, such as PDAs (or personal digital assistants) and cellular telephones, are typically more portable than a disc player. However, electronic formats are generally very easy to copy, e.g. pirate.
Digital rights management (“DRM”) schemes have been developed to control piracy. A common DRM measure is to only permit data to play on a registered device. For example, some data providers require the user to install proprietary software on the user's computer to download data then only allow the user to transfer the downloaded content to attached devices that are “registered” by the software. Since this data is only playable on registered devices (even if the user has a legitimate, paid-for copy of the data), the data will not play on, for example, a new device or a new computer until the user changes the settings on the user's account. Ultimately, however, this form of DRM is not closely tailored to the problem of copying and piracy because the user with a legitimate, paid-for copy of the data may be unduly burdened by the requirement to register each device to play the data while the user who wishes to pirate a copy of the data can easily find utilities online to “crack” the DRM and pirate the data, such as media content.